Work Text:
Minhyuk watched as Kihyun stirred the bubbling blue mixture in the cauldron in his workspace, keeping an eye on the front door alongside Changkyun in case any customer wandered in. Kihyun hummed as he worked, putting the finishing touches on his latest potion.
“Here,” the witch said after pouring the concoction into a vial. “Good luck tomorrow.”
He grinned, setting the potion onto the counter next to countless others. It was already cold to the touch, even though it was sitting over the fire just moments ago. “Thanks, Kihyunnie~”
His friend made a face. “Yeah, whatever. Don’t call me that. And make sure to take the potion tonight to let the effects set, or else it might not activate in time. Remember to practice too, since the spell doesn’t magically give you mad archery skills, it just enhances what skills you already have.”
Minhyuk rolled his eyes at his friend’s nagging. Having known the witch and his familiar since he was a child, Minhyuk knew the rules of potions by heart.
His visit to Kihyun earlier that afternoon had been impromptu, when he returned from archery practice. Since Minhyuk had a competition the following day, he wanted to try and score a good luck charm off of Kihyun. It was by chance that the witch had been experimenting with potions that day, which led to the creation of the accuracy potion for his competition.
It wasn’t considered cheating; not really. In a world where magic ran rampant, it was no secret that each participant had connections to those born with magic to enhance their skills, especially for sport competitions. The participants simply had to be discreet about it, and the unspoken rule was that if the judge chose to turn a blind eye, it wasn’t illegal.
Besides, Minhyuk was fully confident that he would be able to win without any magical help, seeing as he has held the title of best archer in the village since he began archery five years ago. The potion was just an extra guarantee, and it might not even work properly, so no harm would be done.
“Anyway, I gotta go now. Hoseok is expecting me for dinner~” Minhyuk sing-songed, grabbing the vial off the counter as he blew Kihyun a kiss.
“Tell him I said hi. Now get out,” Kihyun ordered in mock disgust.
With one last wave, Minhyuk left the trinket shop, afraid that his friend might decide to start experimenting with polymorph spells that would turn him into an insect.
When he returned to the small wooden house he called home, Hoseok was nowhere to be seen. As the village’s only blacksmith, his boyfriend tended to work late so Minhyuk wasn’t too concerned. Instead, he turned on his ‘housewife mode’, leaving the potion on the dining table in favour of gathering ingredients for dinner.
Minhyuk put out the fire when he finished cooking, leaving the stew sitting on the cast iron stove. The sun had almost completely set, and knowing Hoseok, he wouldn’t be back for another hour or so. Deciding that he may as well drink the potion now to let the effects settle, Minhyuk uncorked the vial. The liquid inside was a diluted green and smelled of fish. He made a face and held his breath, downing the potion in one shot.
Immediately, his eyelids felt heavy, and Minhyuk stumbled into his bedroom to take a nap. A nap wouldn’t hurt, and he was probably just experiencing some side effects of the accuracy potion. The last thought that crossed his mind impulsively was an inexplicable craving for warm milk.
~
It was much darker when Minhyuk woke up. A single candle shone from the dining table, and he narrowed his eyes at the piercing light. Yawning, he slid out from under the covers to rub at his face, trying to wake himself up, only to find…fur?
Minhyuk tumbled from the bed in a tangle of bedsheets and clothes, finding that everything in the house was six times too big. He looked down at his hands, seeing white paws rather than human hands. Panicking, he tried to call for help, but the only sound that would come out of his mouth was a high pitched mewling. Minhyuk padded over to the full length mirror - a luxury in their small village - near the door of the bedroom and gasped at his reflection.
Staring back at him was a small kitten, white with patches of black and orange. Changkyun could probably tell him what type of cat he was, but at the moment Minhyuk just wanted to find out why he was a cat and how to turn back. Experience with witches and spells helped him stay calm, but he felt a sense of claustrophobia rising with each second he spent in his tiny, furry body.
Letting out another meow since he couldn't speak, Minhyuk dashed towards the dining table, surprising a tired Hoseok who was setting the table. His boyfriend stumbled backwards with a yelp, nearly dropping a spoon to catch the cat.
"Wha - where did you come from?" Hoseok asked, his voice sounding distorted and louder.
Minhyuk let out a wail of despair, but of course Hoseok couldn't understand him. He leaped from Hoseok’s arms to land on the table, nosing the empty vial that had green residue left in the bottom. It was definitely the potion that caused this change, and now that he thought about it, he might have grabbed the wrong vial from the counter in his haste to flee from Kihyun's wrath. The mixture the witch had been stirring was blue.
Stupid, he scolded himself, but now was not the time for self-deprecation. He had bigger problems, like turning back into a human, or telling Hoseok what happened so his boyfriend could help.
"Hello," Hoseok said in a softer voice, the one he used around cute animals. Having overcome his initial surprise, he was now approaching the distressed kitten, extending a cautious hand forward.
Minhyuk nudged into his palm, but that only made Hoseok pet him. He purred, closing his eyes in content, before snapping his eyes wide open again. He dashed to the other end of the table, leaving Hoseok looking confused and a little hurt.
Hoseok went back to setting the table, keeping an eye on him. "I wonder where Minhyuk is," Hoseok mused to himself. "It's not like him to just make dinner and then leave."
Minhyuk mewled loudly in complaint, glaring at his boyfriend in betrayal. It took all his willpower to refrain from scratching Hoseok with his newfound claws, and he had to remind himself that Hoseok was clueless as to what was happening. He had to catch on fast, though, because Minhyuk was starting to have an urge to catch rats, and he really wouldn't be thrilled if he actually went off to chase rodents.
Trying again, he meowed to get Hoseok's attention, before head butting the potion's vial insistently. Upon the look of confusion on his human, Minhyuk nudged the glass vial, putting a paw on the insignia all potions from Kihyun's shop had.
"Kihyun? He went to Kihyun's shop?"
Minhyuk snarled in frustration, though to Hoseok it sounded more like an adorable growl. He jumped on Hoseok's lap, glaring at him with huge eyes in hopes that he would understand.
The moment he put the pieces together was almost comical, except the appeal of hunting mice was growing stronger and preventing him from thinking there was anything funny about the situation.
"You-" Hoseok choked on his words. "You're Minhyuk?"
He nodded as much as he could with the cat body. Finally.
"I'm taking you to Kihyun. And when he turns you back, I expect a good reason why you turned into a cat in the first place."
Hoseok scooped him up, grabbed the empty vial, and rushed across the village, Minhyuk snuggling closer to his warmth. His boyfriend opened the shop's door loudly, making the chimes clash together in a cacophony that made him duck down to muffle his ears.
"Hoseok," Kihyun said by way of greeting, not looking up from whatever the pile of papers on his counter was supposed to be. "What's up?"
Hoseok dumped him unceremoniously next to the papers, and Changkyun in cat form walked over to sniff him curiously. Minhyuk had seen Kihyun's familiar as a cat many times before, but seeing him as a fellow cat was unsettling.
"I don't know what you did to Minhyuk, but turn him back," Hoseok said, gesturing to Minhyuk who was batting Changkyun's prowling paws away from his face.
His demand made Kihyun look up in amusement, finally noticing the other cat on the counter. "He grabbed the wrong potion earlier, and the shop was too busy for either of us to tell him," the witch explained, though Minhyuk detected a faint smile on his face. Having been with him all afternoon, he knew that Kihyun didn't have any customers and would not experience a rush hour that just so happened to occur after his departure. Had he been in human form, Minhyuk would have been complaining and crossing his arms as he pouted, but since he couldn't do those things, he settled on glaring holes into the witch.
Hoseok raked a hand through his hair and sighed, looking positively done with the situation. "Can you turn him back, or what?"
"Yeah, just give me a moment," Kihyun replied, moving to the back of the room to rifle through the shelves for an antidote. Changkyun left Minhyuk's side to assist the witch in his search.
"I dunno," Kihyun mused when he returned, holding a pale purple potion in his hand. With his other hand, he petted Minhyuk's head, laughing and drawing his fingers back before they were bitten. "He makes a cute cat. Less annoying like this, too."
Minhyuk stayed still and seethed, since he couldn't exactly attack the person that held the antidote. Even so, he narrowed his eyes at Kihyun to show his displeasure at being a cat.
"I think you should give him the antidote now, he looks like he's about to kill you," Hoseok joked, looking less tired than before.
Wouldn't be able to kill you if he stayed a cat, Changkyun told Kihyun, who seemed to understand from the agreeing smile on his face.
You speak cat?! Minhyuk meowed, thinking that the situation would have been resolved much quicker if he'd known that fact.
"My familiar is a cat, of course I can," Kihyun answered, much to the confusion of Hoseok who couldn’t understand them. "Here, take this and go transform upstairs. You can borrow my clothes."
Even though he was talking to Minhyuk, Changkyun was the one who grabbed the vial in his mouth and smoothly leaped onto the first step, looking behind him expectantly. Minhyuk followed his lead, jumping off the counter and running up the stairs.
A few minutes later, a very human Minhyuk walked down the stairs on two legs, exhaling in relief at being finally back in his own body.
"What about the accuracy potion?" Changkyun, who was now also in human form, wondered as he idly played with the forgotten blue vial.
"It's too late now for the effects to set in," Minhyuk answered, leaning on Hoseok by the shelves. "I didn't need it in the first place, so tomorrow should be fine."
"You'll do great," Hoseok assured him, pecking him on the nose. He smiled. The events of the evening had exhausted him, and he was just glad that he wasn't a cat anymore.
"At any rate, I'm done with spells. I'll just rely on my skills tomorrow," Minhyuk added.
"You should take a good luck charm, at least," Kihyun said. It was his way of showing he cared, despite his teasing tone.
"Yah, Kihyunnie, you don't believe in me?" Minhyuk said indignantly.
He chose a good luck charm shaped like a cat as he left the shop, anyway. Just in case.